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UNITED 8 1TATE8

PARTMENT of the INTERIOR

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *news release REMARKS BY ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR JOHN A. CARVER, JR., AX 3 P.K., SATURDAY, SEPTEMBD. 1~, 1964, AX BALTIMORE~ MARYLAND, DEDICATING THE USS CONSTELLAXION AS A· REGISTERED NATIONAL HISTORIC LANDMARK

The designation of a famed fighting ship as a national historic landmark may seem anomalous. But it is not unprecedented--the Constitution is now moored in Boston, and the !lympia of Manila Bay fame is berthed at Philadelphia.

Equivalent semantic disputes are quite common. The National Park Service wrestled for a long tillte with the question of whether the beach, dunes, and related natural phenomena associated with seashores at Cape Hatteras, Cape Cod, Point Reyes, and Padre Isl~d--each of which is a unit of the national park system authorized by Congress as a uNational Seashore11--were sufficient precredent to justify calling similar areas on the shores o~f the Great Lakes "national seashores. n Proposals at Sleeping Bear and Pictured Rocks, as well as Indi:ana Dunes, all had to have names as they were sent tQ Congress, and the Department and the Park Service decided to stick with the established name--'~ational Sea­shores."

It is one of my vivid recollections of President Kennedy' to be in his office with Secretary Udall going over a ~osed message oi1 these and other proposals, and seeing hill, readi:ng the pageswith lightning speed, stopping on the word "seashoresn. ''You've made a mis~ake," he said; ''you mean 1 lake shores 1 "• And 11Lakeshorestt I 1m sure they 111 be, when and if Congress authorizes them.

The honor ::~i~]we today pa,y to the Constellation is long overdue and the long.~i_slof the Flag House Association in preparing for this occasion are to pe highly commended.

President Franklin Roosevelt aptly named this venerable vessel "a ship gf destiny". She is also a s)"'IU>ol of America 1 s destiny. As the fir st naval vessel of the United States to take to the seas, her history spans the period from the administration of George Washington to that of Lyndon B. Johnson. She served under active commission from the wars with the Barbary pirates ~o World War II. She was an active ship of the combat line for nearly seven decades of this nation's struggle against foreign enmity and internal discord.

The story of the Constellation ,contains a lesson for the present and the future of our natio.n, as well as recall:l.ng tt:aa great past. W'ith but a brief few ll6nths of premalture retirement in 1858 and 1859, this proud vessel did courageous combat duty as a ship of the line for

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siJty-five years--in the M!adit.errj&ae4D, the Caribbea~, in defense of Hampton .Roads .in 1812, in the inl!and waters of China, in protecting the independence of Hawaii.

Consider the e<p1ivalent s~n, in ,terms of military hardware. Sixty­five years antedates . tbe a~rplane itself; now major weapons systems become obsolete before thev can be built. The B-70 bomber, for example, has been di~carde4 before the first one reached production.

And consider relative costs. Bv~ by the standards of the 18th and 19th century, the Constel1.t:l.on ~ouldnot have been an expensive instrumentality of war. l~r more has been .spent rebuilding her than her original cost, I 1atoiili&~~;1The complexity of the modern world pre­cludesus from using our military !hardware for one decade• much less six, and half of our national budget goes for defense.

These are the facts of the 20th century. However ·much we might wish otherwise, we can't turn back the clock.

Challenges to American •. f. ~fess .were an~wered in the eig~teenth ce.ntury by the hard oak· . . . · of .such sh1ps as this. The challenges we face today demand more•1•resil:fiency for change must become a key par.t of our armament. .Let; us put our past in true perspective. We must honor it and derive i~spiration from it. But the future belongs to vision and invention. ••ithe~ weapons systems. nor social insti­tutions of another generat1ion can meet today 1s needs-~any more than the Constellation can subsltitute for Polaris mobility and fire power.

Baltimore, home of the clflpper ship, was the birthplace of the £2!!.:, stellation, this city's cc>ntribution to defense of a young and vibrant nation. Now she is back ~ome••as a reminder to us of the sacrifices made in the past so that our gen.ration might push on to the.magni-ficent future that Americans all seek. ·

The face of America is ch~ing •. Our people cannot be expected to live at a twentieth century pace under the housing and transportation standards of the eighteen~h or nineteenth century, any more than our defense can be handled by the §enstejlation or its counterparts. We will soon be 300 million strona in.these United States, compared to the 4 million who lived here when the Constellation took to the seas. Living space for such a pqpulace dictates that the obsolete tenement and the tortuous lane gtve way tQ modern, safe·and comfortable facili­ties. But in the rush to !modernize, we must carefully screen for the sym6ols of our rich heritqe.

Just as the Constellat1Pn'nearl1 succumbed to neglect and the ravages of ~he seas, so are ourotlher lal,ldmarks threatened by the wrecking ball and bulldozer. Totl&! • •rlt an aChievement in protecting a significant chapter out of a brave ad colo'l'ful naval tradition. This

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work must go on so that our children and theirs may reli:ve for a few hours the magnificent deeds of w~stern exploration, the literary and philosophi~al contributions to our culture and the great discoveries out of which our technological prowess emerged.

I am indeed proud to have as one of my duties in the Department of the Interior that of participating in the Registered National Historic Landmark Program. We Americans derive strength from the lessons of the past. We take pride in honoring our past--but we make no attempt to live in it. In order to receive this inspiration, however, we must preserve and protect the landmarks of national history.

The National Park Service, under my Department, plays a significant role in this preservation effort. We have in the National Park system more than 50 units which are owned, developed and maintained by the United States because of their historical significance to the nation. We have saved for future generations the holy place of the Polynesian people of Hawaii, Spanish forts at St. Augustine and San Juan, the cradle of American democracy at Independence Hall, the renmants of ancient Indian cultures in New Mexico and Ohio--and in your own city, the birthplace of the national anthem, Fort McHenry. ·

At the same time, however, the richness of America 1s past is identi­fied with many places throughout the land which remain, and ought to remain, in private or non-Federal ownership. The Park Service stimu­lates and encourages the preserv~tion of such sites--by close co­operation with state and local historical societies and by giving recognition to the histori.cal significance of their work through the National Historic Landmark program. In accepting such recognition, the owners of these historic sites undertake to maintain them in good condition for the future and to open.them to periodic inspection.

The Historic Landmarks Program is an outgrowth of the Congressional declaration, in 1935, making a national policy of the preservation for public use of historic sites, buildings and objects of national significance.

That came during the second wave of the Conservation movement. The first swept forward under a great Republican President, Theodore Roosevelt. Then the effort ebbed until the Thirties, when the second period came under a great Democratic President, Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

And as President Johnson said 10 days ago when he signed two landmark conservation bills:

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"Anyone that objectively studies, the record of the 88th Congress I think would have to conclude that another historic period has begun this year. 0

He added: "No single Congress in my memory has done so much to keep America as a good and wholesome and beaut~ful place to live. I think it is significant that these st~ps have broad support not just from the Democratic Pal:'ty, but the Republican Party, both parties in the Congress • • • So it seems to me that this reflects a new and strong National consensus to look ahead, and more than that, to plan ahead; better still, to move ahead."

True leadership, he pointed out, must provide for the next decade and not merely the next day.

The men who sailed the Cpnatellation recognized that truth. We are in debt to them for preparing the way for us, .. and we in our turn must pre­pare the way for future Americans, not call a halt.

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